Health Information Exchange (HIE) has rapidly developed across the United States over the past three years but there is an elusive word attached to its future:  Sustainability.  Building and operating exchange capacity outside corporate structures has historically relied almost solely on federal, state and private grant dollars, all aimed at improving health care delivery outcomes and efficiency in the United States.

Developing HIE Sustainability

Today we find ourselves in the final year of the State HIE Program and recognize the imperative to assist our grantees and stakeholders in the quest to develop business services and practices that will ensure HIE sustainability.  Some time ago ONC began discussing the modular development of services that provide high value and leverage the investment that has been made with federal HITECH funding.

Tactical Issue Briefs Now Available

Through a contract with Audacious Inquiry, we are now posting three tactical issue briefs outlining modular services that can be used by organizations to help sustain the State HIE efforts that were begun through the HITECH funding. These briefs provide a snapshot into high value additions organizers may want to consider offering individually, or as a part of an HIE suite of services, covering areas including:

• Prescription Drug Monitoring Programs,
• High Utilizers of health care services, and
• Prospective Care projections.

The Evolving HIE Infrastructure

Old models of exchange were heavily reliant on basic query and retrieve mechanics that don’t necessarily meet the most pressing business needs of an evolving health care system.  The best of the recently developed HIE infrastructure has been built in a way that is lightweight and nimble enough to do many more than two things at once.  And that is very good news for HIE sustainability.  Emerging “value added” services not only increase the functionality that can be offered through HIE but also broaden the market for participants – and their potential revenue income.

We hope these tactical briefs will help you discover and understand high value modular services that can be integrated into existing infrastructures to do just that.

All three reports are available today on HealthIT.gov.  We hope you will find these reports useful and please do not hesitate to contact me at lee.stevens@hhs.gov or John Rancourt at john.rancourt@hhs.gov if you have any questions.